


Mondscheinsonate

by katopiyo



Series: Evens Month 2020 [1]
Category: Gundam Wing
Genre: Evens Month 2020, Gen, M/M
Language: English
Status: Completed
Published: 2020-08-01
Updated: 2020-08-01
Packaged: 2021-03-05 23:54:19
Rating: General Audiences
Warnings: No Archive Warnings Apply
Chapters: 1
Words: 999
Publisher: archiveofourown.org
Story URL: https://archiveofourown.org/works/25643854
Author URL: https://archiveofourown.org/users/katopiyo/pseuds/katopiyo
Summary: Flowers and people like them were just the same - built and raised for the sake of others and left to die when the time came. 2→4.
Relationships: Duo Maxwell/Quatre Raberba Winner
Series: Evens Month 2020 [1]
Series URL: https://archiveofourown.org/series/1859044
Kudos: 3





	Mondscheinsonate

**Author's Note:**

> Takes place after episode 17 with references and heavy inspiration from official GW works by Mato. Also unintentionally inspired by a work in an unofficial GW anthology whose mention I'm unsure about violating rules pertaining to advertising.  
> I want to know where Duo actually got that bandaid in episode 19.  
> Counterpart to [Clair de Lune](https://archiveofourown.org/works/26210095).

From space, the moon looks haunted.  
  
Grey and cold, it looms in Earth's orbit, the two bodies' gravities interacting to move the ocean tides and hold the colony clusters in place.  
  
On Earth, the moon shines like a distant jewel, crusty craters blurred by the distance and the atmosphere. For Earth-born people it's the basis of innumerable legends and fairy tales. Duo never understood why until he saw it himself. The way the moon glowed from Earth was like magic.  
  
The heavier-feeling gravity during liftoff is dizzying, sickening, and thank god Duo's stomach is mostly empty because he can only just barely hold everything in as the capsule hurtles through the air.  
  
He slams face-first against a covered panel with a cough and a wheeze when he gets far enough away from Earth, past the atmosphere, weight melting away. When he releases himself from his seat belt and peers through the capsule's window, he sees the moon again, this time reflected in clear blue waters, reflecting clear blue skies.  
  
Maybe Earth wasn't so bad.  
  
Maybe the weird weather wasn't so bad.  
  
Maybe he had to hide out to avoid getting killed, but exploring was fun - seeing weird glowing bugs at night and while running hands through damp, messy, genuine Earth dirt for the first time, then trying to find shelter from sudden rain, catching lightning as it crosses the sky, then waiting for real, live thunder to rumble in the distance.  
  
Earth as an experience was only what one made of it. The planet itself wasn't bad. It was just that some people had to ruin everything. The same people they had to fight off to go back to space. The same people that turned his and the other pilots' homes against them.  
  
Duo crinkles his face in a mixture of anger and disgust and general distress and feels a sting somewhere on his nose.  
  
Lightly, he runs a finger across the area and holds it up to the light from the window to be met with the sight of blood. Weakly, he lets out a laugh.  
  
He fumbles around, opening different compartments to look for something to cover the cut, finding precisely nothing.  
  
Annoyed, he idly floats back to look through the window again at Earth's signature blue, slowly drifting away. Slipping into his pocket, his right hand comes into contact with something small, and it makes a sound that's just barely audible.  
  
Duo pulls the item out and examines it.  
  
It's paper, neatly folded, but wrinkled from having been stuck in a fabric friction trap for a little too long.  
  
Hesitantly, he opens it.  
  
A bundle of adhesive bandages escape, revealing pristine longhand script, curly, but perfectly legible, hand-written in ink that wouldn't bleed or smudge.  
  
_These are for you, just in case._  
  
_Take care,_  
_Quatre R. Winner_  
  
Duo draws in a sharp breath at the name.  
  
The other pilot probably slipped it into his pocket just before they went out to fight again.  
  
Idiot. Moron. Stupid.  
  
Self-sacrificing bastard.  
  
Duo knew he shouldn't have expected anyone to stick around. Not with the current state of the world. Not when they were all kid soldiers who could die at any time. He shouldn't have gotten attached.  
  
But what the hell. How couldn't he?  
  
It felt like just yesterday that they'd sat in the safe house at sunset, talking about mundane things like flowers, when through made-up trivia, Quatre fooled Duo into thinking that those ladies from the Maguanacs' town thought they both were cute in an attempt to joke and lighten the mood.  
  
"Sorry," he'd apologized softly, a small smile across his face. "You just looked so down. I couldn't just stand there and do nothing."  
  
At that comment, Duo couldn't do much more than just stare while Quatre chuckled before changing the subject.  
  
Quatre was right when he'd said that sitting around and sulking - in the case back then, over dying flowers - would get the two of them nowhere, but Duo still stood by his own thoughts.  
  
Flowers and people like them were just the same - built and raised for the sake of others and left to die when the time came. Duo being the only one to live that life should've been plenty - that's what he'd always thought.  
  
He didn't want anyone else to fall to that fate - especially not Quatre.  
  
Not the funny rich kid who was a little awkward, but kind and carefully optimistic. Not the kid who helped patch his soul back together piece by piece after watching one of their only other allies explode in a blaze of resistance and fury, falling lifelessly to the ground. Not the kid with the soft golden hair and the gorgeous blue-green eyes who smiled gently at him when he tried to get him to come inside so he wouldn't catch cold while he sat out every night, watching the moon in the dark navy sky.  
  
He should've figured that that overwhelming kindness might make him do something stupid.  
  
"Have you lost your mind!? We _all_ have to make it to outer space!" Duo had yelled.  
  
"I know, but that's why I have to back you up," Quatre insisted.  
  
He didn't get it.  
  
Duo stares blankly at the glass - past his reflection and past the thin little paper packets floating around him - watching patches of white swirl over familiar bright blue before he turns back to the note, clutching it as tightly as he can manage without damaging the paper.  
  
"All of us means you too, idiot," he mutters.  
  
It didn't make sense.  
  
But then again, nothing about war made any sense.  
  
With a heavy sigh, Duo gathers the stray bandages and folds them back into the note.  
  
...All except for one, which he unwraps and presses over his nose.  
  
"There we go," he laughs bitterly under his breath, looking back through the capsule window.  
  
In the distance floats the moon in all its glory - big, round, and dead in color.  
  
Just the same as ever.


End file.
